Boston celebrates addiction recovery month

By Kelly Egan

The Massachusetts Organization for Addiction Recovery (MOAR), held an event celebrating recovery month this past Thursday in the Boston Common. 

For the past 33 years, MOAR has celebrated recovery month here in Boston, promoting and supporting new evidence-based treatments and practices surrounding addiction by bringing together the nation’s recovery community. 

Founded in 1991, MOAR was created to meet with other addiction-oriented groups and to support a continuum of care that includes peer recovery support services. They’ve celebrated multiple decades of recovery month and alcohol awareness month. 

The event began at the Parkman Bandstand Thursday morning, with the group making they’re way to the Shubert Theatre. In the opening ceremony, MOAR facilitated multiple guest speakers: executive director of MOAR, Maryanne Frangules, MOAR board president Kevin McCarthy, teacher at Austin Recovery, and Boston Public Health Commissioner Bisola Ojikutu.

Frangules and McCarthy both shared their own personal connections with addiction recovery in their speeches. McCarthy believes in this organization and event because it shows that the voices of people in recovery are “not just vocal, but physical.”

“[People in recovery from addiction] are to be acknowledged in this community as the future of America,” McCarthy said in his speech. 

Ojikutu expressed her gratitude towards being a guest speaker at Recovery Day for a third time. 

“Each year [Recovery Day] gets bigger and better,” Ojikutu said in her speech.

In a personal interview, Ojikutu says that this event is about hope and resilience.

“[Recovery Day] is about recognizing the work and how hard it is, but how it is successful at the end of the day,” Ojikutu said. “I think this is meant to be a joyful event.”

Ojikutu hopes that this event will show people that they’re not alone.

“I think [recovery] can feel lonely especially when sometimes this isn’t at the top of the agenda,” Ojikutu said. “To be [at Recovery Day] together with people who are like minded is important.”